The present invention relates to a system for cleaning an on-vehicle optical sensor and a method for cleaning an on-vehicle optical sensor.
Recent vehicles often include on-vehicle optical sensors at the front or rear to use the images captured by the on-vehicle optical sensors. Foreign matter such as mud may collect on a sensing surface (e.g., lens or protection glass) of an on-vehicle optical sensor. Thus, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2001-171491 proposes an on-vehicle optical sensor cleaning system that ejects water and air having high pressure (water/compressed air) from a nozzle toward the sensing surface to remove the foreign matter.
Although the on-vehicle optical sensor cleaning system such as that described above uses a compressed air generating unit, there is no specific mention of how high-pressure cleaning liquid (water) is ejected. There is a demand for a technique for ejecting the cleaning liquid under higher pressure to increase the cleaning effect.